The Last Survivor
by Mrs Amy Lee
Summary: AU, based on an alternative ending that sees Acres survive the fall from the shaft. Ten years after the disaster, the sinking still haunts Acres - the last survivor to be rescued from the SS Poseidon. As New Years Eve approaches, he struggles to deal with terrible memories, and Acres knows he must make a choice - to move on, or to let the past haunt him forever...
1. Chapter 1

**The Last Survivor**

**Summary:**

**It has been 10 years since the SS Poseidon was capsized by a giant wave. As the disaster is remembered and memorial services are planned to mark the anniversary of the sinking, Acres wants no reminders of the ship where he once worked as a waiter, or of the fateful New Year's Eve when the wave had hit the ship and turned the vessel – and his life – upside down forever.**

**Although a decade has passed by, Acres can not forget the fall from the shaft and the near drowning in the swirling water, nor can he forget the injuries sustained in that fall, or the fact that after the rest of the survivors had got out, he was found barely alive some twelve hours later by a rescue party sent into the stricken vessel – and then became known as the Poseidon's final survivor.**

**But even though much time has passed, and in that time Acres has fallen in love with and married Nonnie, a fellow survivor, and is now raising a family – the Poseidon tragedy still haunts him, along with the memory of the fall from the shaft, and a recurring thought that after he fell, no one went down into that water and made a real effort to look for him, they had simply gone on, assuming him dead.**

**With the tenth anniversary of the sinking growing closer, bringing back terrible memories he has tried to bury, Acres realises the time has come to make a choice – to either find a way to lay the demons of the past to rest forever, or to be haunted by them for the rest of his days...**

* * *

**Author Note:**

**This fic should be considered AU as it looks at the alternative possibility that Acres survived the fall from the shaft. It is also written based on the 1972 Poseidon Adventure movie character Acres and does not take into account the Poseidon book or the sequel movies or remakes.**

* * *

**Rated T**

* * *

**Disclaimer: I own nothing at all - I write for love of fandom and fan fiction.**

* * *

Chapter 1

Christmas of 1982 had been and gone. Now it was slowly edging towards the end of the holiday season and with it was coming the day that Acres hated and tried to avoid all reminders of:

_New Year's Eve._

The former cruise ship worker was sure there were many people who hated the new year celebrations for various reasons, like drinking too much, or doing stupid stuff whilst being far too drunk, but none of that came close to why he hated that time of year so much:

_Acres hated New Year's Eve because that was the night of the party on board the SS Poseidon, the night the ship was hit by a giant wave and turned over._

He had spent the first part of the early hours of New Year's Day struggling to work his way up through the turned over vessel, and then as they had climbed out into a shaft, he had struggled with the ladder that was bolted to the wall, due to the injuries he had sustained when the ship had turned.

He was the only wounded amongst the small party of survivors, and as explosions had rocked the ship, he had lost his grip and plunged down into swirling waters that had snatched hold of him and slammed him against the side of the shaft, that water had dragged him down then swirled up and slammed him about again, and by the time he reached a rail and clung on and used the last of his strength to haul himself up and crawl through a doorway, the others had gone.

Acres had slammed shut that water tight door and found strength he never knew he had to turn the handle. Then he had hit the floor and heard the water pound the other side of the door, but felt no pain, only a creeping chill and as he looked down at his clothing he saw it was ripped and heavily blood stained. His injured leg had turned numb and he saw torn flesh and white bone, but still there was no pain.

Then he had closed his eyes, and the world had disappeared for a while.

And _that_ was how he had spent the early hours of New Year's Day – fighting alone to survive while the rest of the survivors had gone on without him...

_Acres knew they would not come back._

Then he had felt the walkway where he lay in the maintenance area shudder as more explosions made the ship shift alarmingly.

And many, many hours later, he had woken to hear footsteps and as he saw the door opening, he had drawn in a slow and painful breath and then remembered whilst being slammed about in the water, he had hit a wall and something had smashed against his throat. Breathing was difficult and speech was impossible.

And the rescue party opened up the door and looked down at him.

"_This one's dead,"_ he heard one of them say, and realised they were referring to him.

And that was the moment when Acres had decided he was going to live, and he had closed his numb hand around a broken pipe and used the last of his strength to tap the metal wall.

The men had stopped and looked back.

Acres had tried to breathe, and then he had dropped the pipe.

And the medics had shot him full of something that made the world fade out, and then they had taken him out of the stricken vessel to a waiting helicopter.

And _that_ was how he had spent New Year's Day, after being rescued, being flown over to a nearby ship – one of many that were taking part in the rescue mission as military personnel from several countries worked united to keep the ship afloat and pump out water from flooded compartments. They were wasting their time, of course.

_Everyone else was dead..._

Yes, Acres definitely had a _very_ valid reason to dislike New year's Eve.

Over the years, his wife had tried to persuade him to go to parties with her on December 31st – but they always ended up staying home.

His wife was Nonnie, formerly a singer in the ship's band and a fellow Poseidon survivor. Nonnie had mourned the death of her brother Teddy very deeply, but even she had moved on now, and rarely mentioned the disaster at all, except for when the year came to a close and she would say she thought they were lucky to have survived.

Acres didn't feel lucky at all, he felt he simply just survived because he had been determined not to die, and luck had nothing to do with it...

And now it had been ten years since the disaster. Acres and his wife lived in a quiet London suburb, far from the sea - and they had been there in a three bedroom semi detached house for the past seven years, ever since the compensation payouts had been made to the survivors and they had decided to put some of the money into a place of their own.

Nonnie had wanted to travel to New York to meet up with the other survivors for the tenth anniversary. Acres had told her she had better be okay about doing that on her own, and then she had quietly agreed they would stay home instead. And then she had mentioned there was a memorial service in a local church, because a handful of the crew who had lost their lives that night were from London, and she suggested they ought to go along.

_No_ had been his only response and then Nonnie had dropped the subject as their nine year old daughter had come into the room and asked what they were talking about. Their daughter Charlotte knew nothing about the disaster, and Nonnie had been reminding him lately that it really was time to talk to her about it – that was another suggestion that got a firm _no_ from Acres.

And so the days were passing and New Year's Eve was approaching, and the closer it got, the worse he felt, but said nothing about this to his wife because he felt as if he wanted to nail up the subject in a box and weight it down with chains, and then throw it into something as deep and terrible as the ocean that had swallowed the ship ten years before...

* * *

As he woke up to another day edging closer to the end of December, Acres turned on his side, caught a view of the winter sky through net curtains and then turned on his back and closed his eyes again, wanting to be warm and to stay warm, with no reminders of anything beyond the house.

Then he felt a soft kiss on his cheek, right over a faint scar, one of many scars he carried on his body - a legacy of the night the ship turned over.

Then he felt her fair hair brush across his shoulder, and then she kissed his lips and said his name, and finally he started to smile, and he opened his dark brown eyes and looked up at her, she was leaning over him and looking down with such love in her eyes that even the cold skies outside that reminded him of angry seas could not chase it away.

"Morning, my love," she said sweetly, and he slid his arms around her and returned that gentle kiss she had used to wake him.

"I'm not getting up yet," he replied, "I want to go back to sleep."

"Okay, you do that," she replied, and got out of bed and put on a dressing gown, "But Charlotte will be up soon and she'll need breakfast, so I have no choice but get up."

And then she turned back to him, kissed him again and left the bedroom.

* * *

As she closed the door behind her, Acres looked around the bedroom with its floral walls and white furniture and green velvet drapes and gave a sigh, thinking if only the curtains were shut, he could ignore the sky and the time of year, and he could just go back to sleep.

_He wished he could sleep until New Year was over and done with..._

Acres thought about the past again, because he had no choice, because he _always_ did at this time of the year – but this time, he recalled Nonnie, that girl who had helped him as he made his way with the others up through the ship, she had clung on to him and supported him, and even after he had been rescued, she still supported him, but this time with her presence.

With her brother gone in the disaster, she had no one. And so when she heard that he had survived, she had got on a plane three weeks after the sinking and joined him in Britain. He had woken up in hospital and she had been at his bedside.

Her first words had been, _"We all thought you drowned. Mr Rogo went back down the ladder but the water was coming in and there were so many explosions – he couldn't do a thing. And we had to keep moving. I cried for you the whole time..."_

A chill was creeping over him, the memory of the sinking was getting too close again.

He pushed it aside and thought instead about how he used to watch Nonnie in the dining room of the ship, while she was on the stage practising her singing. He had been struck by her beauty back then and had planned eventually to make a move on her. But after the ship had turned over all plans had changed – but she had still found him, and here they were a decade later, married with a daughter...

Charlotte was a bright and happy nine year old, with his eyes and Nonnie's fair hair. And she didn't know a thing about the SS Poseidon and he wanted it to stay that way - even though Nonnie had not given up on reminding him that she needed to know what her parents had been through one day...

The window howled outside and shook a skeleton tree branch and clouds rolled over and in on each other, reminding him of waves at sea, as if the sky mirrored the water that had claimed the ship on that terrible night.

He gave a sigh and decided to get out of bed, needing to be with his family, because this time of year was_ not _a time to be alone for too long, not with the way the memories came at him out of nowhere, like ghosts determined to tap him on the shoulder, maybe the ghosts of fellow crew members, asking him what he thought he was doing, still living his life when they were all dead and gone...

"_Stop it!"_ Acres said sharply as he pushed away crazy thoughts and got out of bed, now he was determined to face another day – even though time edged closer to New Year's Eve...

* * *

Twenty minutes later he was showered and dressed, and then he went downstairs to the kitchen to join his family for breakfast.

Nonnie looked beautiful in the silken dressing gown she had tied about a slender body that he longed to wrap his arms around – but that would have to wait until much later, because their daughter was at the table.

She set a breakfast of bacon and eggs in front of him and then a mug of hot tea and turned back to the cooker where she began to fry her own breakfast.

And as Acres started to eat, his daughter finished her meal and put down her knife and fork and then drank some orange juice.

"Dad," she said, "How did you meet my mum?"

And as Nonnie finished making her breakfast she pushed her fair hair off her shoulder and looked around.

"Now might be a good time," she said to him.

Acres gave a sigh.

"I don't think so, Nonnie."

"A good time for what?" Charlotte asked, looking curiously at her father.

As Acres looked into her eyes, he knew Nonnie was right. Charlotte was getting older, and sooner or later, she would hear something about the disaster, she might even hear her parent's names mentioned, because news of the anniversary was all over the TV news reports and in the newspapers. He didn't want to tell her anything at all, but she had asked, so he tried to keep it brief.

"I was working on a cruise ship," he said to her, "I was waiting tables. Your mum was in a band."

"With my Uncle Teddy who died. How did he die?"

Acres gave another sigh._ Kids and their questions..._

"In an accident," Nonnie replied, and then she sat down at the table, but had left her breakfast on the kitchen worktop, because talk of the Poseidon had put her off eating, and instead she cradled a hot mug of tea in her hands.

"How many ships did you work on?" Charlotte asked, and the change of subject came as a relief.

"A lot," Acres replied, "I was born and raised in Scotland, but I wanted a job that would let me travel and see a bit of the world, so I left home when I was eighteen and got my first job on a cruise liner. And it went from there, I worked on many different ships over the years – saw a lot of countries, met a lot of people, including your mum."

And he glanced at Nonnie and smiled, feeling a rush of love for her as he recalled how she had always been in the habit of calling him Acres since the first time they met on the Poseidon. She still called him Acres now, it was a habit of hers, but he really didn't mind at all. Nonnie smiled back at him, and then their daughter's next question shocked them both:

"Did you ever work on a ship that sunk? I mean, ships can sink, right?"

Acres looked at his wife.

"Tell her," she said quietly, and then she sipped her tea as her gaze nervously darted back to her daughter.

"Yes I did," he replied, "I was working on board a ship called the SS Poseidon. She was hit by a giant tidal wave and turned right over."

Charlotte stared at him.

"Really?"

"Yes, really," Acres replied, "And that was the night I met your Mum. Me and her and a few other people had to make our way through the upside down ship to get to surface. Most of them made it."

Then he paused, frowning as he tried to assemble the right words to explain the rest, but in a way that would not upset his daughter.

"We were making our way through the ship and had to climb a shaft. It was very steep and water was coming in, rising all the time – there was an explosion and I fell. The others thought I was dead. But twelve hours later, thanks to a massive rescue attempt the ship stayed afloat and some of the water was pumped out - and they went down into the ship and found me locked in a room with a watertight door, that was what saved me...and they got me out, and your mum heard I was alive and she came to see me in hospital and that's the end of the story. We got married and had you and..."

Nonnie closed her hand over his, and he was grateful for her gesture of comfort.

"And lived happily ever after," she added.

Charlotte thought for a moment.

"Mum, you used to work the cruise ships with my Uncle Teddy and his band. Was Uncle Teddy there that night?"

And Nonnie's had was still covering his, and Acres felt her hand tremble at the memory.

"Yes he was," she replied honestly, "He died that night, he was killed when the ship turned over."

Charlotte looked to both her parents.

"Why didn't you tell me this before?"

"Because you wasn't old enough to know," Nonnie replied, "But you are now. Me and your dad found each other because of the Poseidon."

"And I think we should leave it there, because there is nothing else to say on it, is there," Acres remarked, and as Nonnie let go of his hand he looked at her and she caught that haunted look in his eyes, a look she had seen so many times before when another year was drawing to a close and New Year was just around the corner.

"Well, there is something else," Nonnie continued, "There is a memorial service for those who died, its being held on New Year's Day at a church not too far from us. I want to go but your father doesn't want to because he would rather not think too much about it. We both think differently about what happened that night, you see."

And she instantly regretted her carefully chosen words as anger flashed in his eyes.

"That's enough – _no_ more talk about that ship!"

"But you should go to the service, it might help you to get rid of the bad memories, it might lay some of it to rest for you!"

"_That's not how I see it."_

He got up from the table and so did his wife, as he cleared away the breakfast plates and put them in the sink she followed him across the kitchen, while their daughter sat at the table, watching and wondering why her usually happy parents seemed to be disagreeing on something that was turning into a quarrel.

* * *

At first they spoke quietly, intending for their daughter to hear none of it, but of course it didn't work out that way, because Nonnie's raising of the subject of the memorial service had hit a raw nerve with Acres.

"I just want you to go to the service," Nonnie said as they stood there by the sink, where beyond a lace curtain came down halfway and the rest of the exposed window showed the view of a neat garden, now darkened down to bottle green by a winter that carried a strong breeze that blew chilly and shook boughs of bare trees.

"I'm not doing it," Acres replied as he turned to the window "I don't need reminders of that night."

"But everyone else is going to services, the other survivors are meeting in New York -"

He looked at her sharply.

"When did you find out about this?"

"You know I stay in touch with all of them! I write to all of them, they are all still around, everyone who got out of that ship is still alive today. That matters a lot to me!"

Anger flashed in his eyes again.

"What did you say, Acres can't come because he's too scared the nightmares might start up again?"

Hurt reflected in Nonnie's eyes.

"No! Of course not, I just said we would probably be going to the London service."

"That's enough," he said to her, "I'm not discussing this any more."

"Why not?" she demanded.

One look in her eyes told him he had upset her, and he wanted to hug her and apologise, but now the anger was too deep and too strong to brush off and in that moment, he felt as if the ship rocked and he lost his grip on the ladder and plunged down into the water all over again.

"_They never came back to look for me!"_ he said bitterly, _"They all just kept moving upwards, climbing back to freedom, no one wanted to risk their life for a wounded waiter who couldn't keep up!"_

Nonnie stared at him.

"No, that's not true –_ I_ helped you, so did the others!"

"But no one went back for me when I fell!"

"Yes, yes they_ did_ Acres – Mr Rogo went back down the ladder -"

"And the water was rushing in and the explosions were happening and he gave up and went back _up_ that ladder!" Acres said bitterly.

Nonnie blinked away tears.

"And I was so afraid I couldn't move," she said tearfully.

_In that moment as she stood beside him with tears in her eyes, he saw her again on that night, a frightened girl, shocked by the loss of her brother and terrified of the prospect of climbing up through the over turned ship..._

"Oh Nonnie, I'm sorry," Acres said, and he wrapped his arms around her and held her tightly.

Then as a chair scraped back and Charlotte got up from the table they both looked at her.

"Did you two just have a fight?"

"No, of course not," Nonnie said to her.

"So why have you been crying?" her daughter asked.

"It's okay now," Acres told her, "Me and your mum just disagreed about something. It's not easy talking about the ship."

"Okay," Charlotte replied, "So maybe you shouldn't talk about it again."

And then she left the room and went back upstairs, keen to play with some of the new toys she got for Christmas.

* * *

Now they were alone, Acres gave his wife another hug and then kissed her before letting go once more.

"I'm sorry," he said to her, "But I can't help thinking like that – and I get so angry -"

"Over something that isn't true!" Nonnie exclaimed, "He really did, Mr Rogo went back down the ladder to try and save you – but it was going crazy down there with the water and the explosions – he couldn't find you, and the water was rising and we had to keep going. We all thought you were dead, I remember holding on to that ladder and sobbing with my eyes closed tightly because I couldn't move or look down. I just couldn't move for thinking about you and what had just happened!"

Acres ran his fingers through his hair and then shook his head as he looked to his wife.

"No, I can't believe what you're saying. I know it's what you believe - but you're not me, Nonnie! You didn't go through what I did! And I'm feeling worse and worse as we get closer to this bloody anniversary!"

"So what are we going to do?" she asked him, "You can't be like this forever, sooner or later you have to find a way to let go of it, otherwise it will always have a hold on you."

A haunted look reflected in his eyes as he met her gaze.

"Maybe it always will," he said quietly, "What can I do about it? I can't change what happened. _Maybe it will always have a hold on me, maybe The Poseidon won't ever let me go..._"


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

_There had been no more talk of the Poseidon that day._

The weather grew colder and the wind blew icy and as the clouds gathered and darkened a light dusting of snow fell, making Acres feel even more relieved to be in the house and not outside, because the cold would always remind him of the water and that fateful night. Sometimes he wondered if the chill of the sea had crept in his bones and settled there forever, a reminder that would last a lifetime...

By ten o'clock that night Nonnie was watching TV in the front room and Charlotte had gone off to bed. And Acres had offered to make some tea, and then he had gone into the kitchen, switched on the kettle, and put on his coat and gone outside, feeling the urge to dare himself to stand out there in the cold, just to see if those bad memories really could get to him as much as it seemed they could – he wasn't sure what was more powerful, the bad recollections, or the idea of them...

He stood alone in the snowy garden wrapped up in a thick winter coat, watching as snowflakes fell thicker now, drifting down to settle on the ground, on the tree branches, on the tops of hedges and along the path. The air felt frozen, but he guessed it couldn't be as cold as he had imagined because he remembered being far colder – the icy water that had claimed him on the night of the sinking had been death-cold. It had numbed him all over, but this fall of snow he stood in now was not having that effect. He put out his hand and let snowflakes land on his palm, then he watched as they began to melt:

_He still had body heat._

_That proved there was no real threat of a sharp reminder of that night the cold had almost chilled him to death..._

So, it was not as bad out here as he had first imagined – on the night the ship turned over he had been so chilled by that water he was almost dead when the rescue party came, almost dead and so very cold, past the point of feeling anything but the fear that gripped him and kept him sharp enough in his mind to make the choice that he _would_ live, he _would_ get out of that ship alive...

The snow was drifting down silently, it seemed to glow against the illumination of the light from the kitchen that shone out from the window, and every flake that drifted seemed to do so in a slow, hypnotic fall.

Now he was starting to feel the cold creep through his coat and he shivered, and then turned away from the falling snow and went back into the house where he hung up his coat, shook the snow from his hair and then made tea for him and Nonnie.

* * *

"You're so quiet tonight, are you okay?"

She had asked him that question as she sat on the sofa, leaning back and watching TV as the fire flickered in the hearth and threw out a comforting heat. Acres, who was beside her, turned his head and looked at her.

"I'm fine, why shouldn't I be?"

Nonnie hesitated.

"I was just thinking, all that talk about the ship today...I know its not easy for you - but Charlotte had to know sooner or later."

"I don't really see why why we had to tell her anything."

He knew he had sounded dismissive again, and he saw hurt in Nonnie's eyes as she looked at him sadly.

I don't want to quarrel with you again, Acres. But it seems to me like you wish we could just pretend it never happened!"

He felt no anger at her accusation.

"You're right, I do feel like that I wish I could wake up in the morning and forget the ship and that night and everything we both went through. I often wish I'd lost my memory of the whole disaster, I'd rather have a nice blank space inside my head, a blank space can't give me nightmares, waking or sleeping -"

"_Waking?"_

He gave a sigh, instantly knowing he had said too much.

"You're having flashbacks again?"

"Yes..._no_, not exactly. Just very sharp memories, and I don't want to be reminded of it any more! Honestly Nonnie, all this talk of the Poseidon is no good for me at all. You shouldn't be surprised I feel as I do, it's almost New Year."

"But I'll always say that was the night that brought us together."

As she spoke, Nonnie toyed with a lock of her fair hair and there was a gentle warmth in her eyes as she looked at him.

Acres gave another sigh.

"Nonnie, we were_ all_ brought together that night – a small group of people who were determined it find a way out. It's called survival instinct, that's what we all had – the instinct to get moving and start climbing and finding a way out. I don't deny there was a connection between you and me, but we had no time to figure out what that meant at the time."

"I knew, as soon as I found out you had survived I just knew I had to be where you were, I needed to be with you. Didn't you feel that way about me?"

Acres looked at her doubtfully.

"Nonnie, I love you. But I sometimes think you make everything sound far too rosy, you know?"

Confusion clouded her eyes.

"What do you mean by that?" she asked him.

Nonnie was a sensitive woman and he did not want to hurt her feelings, but she seemed to have such a very different take on the events that had happened ten years before, a view so different to his own that he could not help but speak out now and get his point cross.

"You seem to think we were all a brave group of people who fate threw together, who came up against the odds and made it through – we kept going because we were _afraid_! You can't deny that, you were terrified!"

"Of course I was -"

"But you don't get it, do you? Nonnie, it was down to luck that we survived the ship turning over and the rest was down to our own choices to try and find a way out. That's_ all_ there is to it. Surviving because we made the choice to hold on to our lives! That's the choice I made, when I was alone and waiting for rescue! I was almost gone but I found the strength to make the rescue party hear me, I'll never forget how they stepped over me. They said, '_This one is dead_' and they meant me, that's when I found strength I didn't know I still had, and I managed to move and to make them hear me! I lived because I'd been determined not to die. So did you. So did everyone who made it out of that ship. _Don't_ make it sound romantic."

She still looked hurt.

"But I was only saying -"

"I know what you were saying, that you feel that night brought you and me together._ It didn't. _You deciding to get on a plane and come to England and keep me company while I was recovering - that's what got us together, it was nothing to do with the night of the sinking."

Nonnie fell silent.

"Let's just leave it alone now," Acres said to her, "And it's getting late. I'm off to bed."

And then he got up and left the room, leaving Nonnie sitting alone on the sofa. She sat there for fifteen minutes watching the news, and then, unexpectedly, old news footage came up of the Poseidon with its hull exposed and the ship underwater as a report went out again mentioning the adversary of the sinking.

The sight of the turned over ship brought back a flood of images to mind, from seeing her brother lying dead to looking around after the dining room had turned over and seeing dead wounded all over the room. She could still hear their screams if she thought about it, and so instead she got up, turned off the TV, put out the fire in the hearth and then and went upstairs to bed.

As she made her way up the stairs she thought of here and now of the fact that Christmas had been and gone and it had been a good one, and that Charlotte had loved all her presents. She thought about how she had better be quiet as she went past her daughter's room so she didn't wake her, and all these thoughts that belonged very much in the present pulled her away from the memories of the past.

Then as she passed her daughter's room, she paused, looking in through the door that had been left ajar:

Charlotte was fast asleep under warm covers, sleeping easily and peacefully. Her room was in darkness, because she loved to snuggle down warm in the dark and go to sleep – such a contrast to her parents, who always slept with a lamp left on. She wasn't sure why but they both preferred to sleep with a light on. Before the Poseidon the dark had never bothered her, and she was pretty sure Acres would never talk about it, so there was no point in asking him if he had needed a light on at night before the sinking, but she guessed the answer to that question was most likely no :

Now they_ both_ needed a light on at night, just to be sure they had that little bit of security, because they both knew that life could change in a split second, that bad things happened randomly and without warning, they needed reassurance in the dark because unlike their child, they had seen how bad life could unexpectedly turn.

_Kids didn't think of the bad stuff._

The only kind of fears they had were imagined monsters under the bed, and Charlotte had never even had those fears. But Nonnie knew it was different for her and Acres, so very different, because they had seen real horror and they would never forget it, and she guessed they would always need to sleep with a light on because of it...

* * *

Acres was already in bed, his back was turned to the window as the wind howled outside and sent a tree branch tapping at the glass. The curtains were closed and the heating was on, in here it was warm, but those reminders of the outside and the chill and the time of year were ever present as the tapping sounded sharply once more on the window and the wind howled again.

Nonnie undressed by the dim light of the bedside lamp, and then she got into bed and put her arm around her husband.

"Goodnight," she whispered, and he shifted closer to her, kissed her cheek and then gave a sigh as her warmth and the closeness of her body finally gave him the comfort he needed to slip into a deep sleep.

Acres had a vague recollection of being in a light sleep that he was woken from when his wife got in bed next to him, but as soon as she was close to him, he was able to drift off into real sleep, a restful, deep place where he could forget everything for a while.

And unfortunately this deep and restful place was also the place where dreams were made, and nightmares too:

_The branch was tapping sharply against the glass._

_It hit it with a final crack that broke the window, and then the curtain was dashed aside as the water began to pour in._

_Acres sat up in bed, looked on in terror as the ocean reached the broken window and the water continued to pour in, running across the carpet, flooding the room, smashing through the doorway and out into the hall, it was filling the house._

_"Daddy!" yelled Charlotte from her bedroom, "Help me!"_

_And somewhere beyond the window, passengers were singing Auld Lang Syne and as he looked to the water that poured in through the window he saw faces in the swirling sea, the faces of those who had drowned on the ship, and as that water poured in it reached for him, to drag him out there, into the sea, with the others..._

* * *

Acres gave a gasp and sat up sharply in bed.

His heart was pounding and he was drenched in sweat and as he looked to the unbroken window he blinked, watched as the tree branched trembled in an early morning breeze, and recalled how it had struck the window the night before.

It had been a dream, a bad dream, a terrible one – so terrible his daughter had been in it too, but it was _just_ a dream...

"Acres?"

He heard Nonnie say his name but he was busy looking over the edge of the bed, to check the carpet was dry. Of course it was dry, there was no sea water...

She said his name again and he looked at her, and she caught a frightened look in his dark eyes and knew at once what had happened.

"Nightmares again?"

He nodded.

"And it was one best left alone. I don't want to talk about it."

"But if you did it might go away -"

"The Poseidon will _never_ go away!"

"I'm only trying to help you!"

He softened his tone, hating to see hurt reflect in her eyes.

"I know that, Nonnie – but you can't help me, I'm stuck with this."

And he lay back down against soft pillows, on his back looking up at the ceiling as his thoughts drifted back to a subject he wanted to forget but couldn't.

"I definitely don't feel guilty for surviving when others didn't," he said quietly, "I know they say some people who survive disasters feel bad about making it out alive when people around them died, but I've never felt that way. I was determined to live and left as I was, by myself, I only had myself to save."

"And I told you before, Mr Rogo did try and go back but he couldn't find you."

Acres gave a heavy sigh.

"I wouldn't know the truth of that because I wasn't there to see it."

Nonnie lay beside him and put her arm around him.

"But I'm your wife and I love you and you _know_ I wouldn't lie about it!"

"I know that, but its just how I see it," he replied, and then he fell silent, thinking once again about the ladder, how his body was full of pain from the injuries he had already sustained when the ship turned over, he recalled the struggle to make it up the ladder, and then the explosion that had caused him to fall.

"Why did you say that, about feeling guilty" she asked him.

"I don't know, in my dreams I feel as if the dead expect me to take my place with them – which is crazy, of course, because no one wanted to die that night – so why would they want to pull me in to join them?"

"Maybe deep down inside, a part of you _does_ feel bad about surviving," Nonnie said to him, "I mean, you think you don't feel anything about it, but maybe you do -"

"No," Acres replied, sounding very sure about it, "I've only ever been thankful to have got out of there and survived. I decided I would live even when I thought there was no chance of being found or rescued. I'd made up my mind not to die that day. That was me, _my_ efforts, all alone. I _definitely_ don't feel guilty for living."

"So it's just the time of year, then,"she concluded, "That has to be the answer, because you always get like this around the end of the year, its just memories."

Acres looked sadly into her eyes.

"So why am I the only one who gets it? You don't get it."

"I guess because we think differently about that night," she reminded him, "And I have you and Charlotte now, my life has changed a lot. I don't look back much – at least I try not to."

He frowned.

"But I don't look back often either - I try never to do it."

"And this time of year it all hits you at once," Nonnie said to him, and then she gave him a gentle kiss.

"Don't think about it any more, dreams can't hurt you. I'd better get up before Charlotte goes downstairs and starts yelling for me to make breakfast."

And then she got up and left him alone in bed, and while she was up and downstairs around the same time as their daughter, Acres stayed in bed a little longer, looking thoughtfully at the window where in his nightmares, sea water had poured through shattered glass.

* * *

That morning was quiet, because after cooking breakfast for Charlotte, Nonnie drove her over to visit with a school friend for the day, and by the time Acres was out of bed and dressed, his wife and daughter had been gone for half an hour. He glanced at the clock in the front room and guessed Nonnie would no doubt stop off in town after taking Charlotte to her friend's house, because she would probably want to get some shopping done, and then he went over to a locked cabinet, took the key off the top of it and used the key to unlock a bottom drawer.

As he took the drawer out and set it down next to him on the sofa, his heart felt heavy and he wondered why he was doing this – in this drawer were press cuttings about the disaster. They were not his, they were Nonnie's, and he had never looked at them until now, and he wasn't sure why he was doing this now - perhaps because he was hoping to face up to the memories, perhaps it would stop the dreams...

But he got an icy chill as he saw a picture of the upturned hull surrounded by water, and read about the sinking as it was laid out in the article.

Acres put the paper back in the drawer and hoped he wasn't inviting more bad dreams, and then took out another set of press cuttings:

He saw some pictures of passengers who had not made it and recognised a few of them from the dining room during the cruise before the disaster, and then he moved on to the next article.

Seeing the faces of the survivors brought the memory back so sharply he was sure every injury had got during that terrible night hurt all over again as if old fractures had all cracked at once.

He drew in a sharp breath as he came to another article, this one was about a final survivor who had been found alive on the stricken vessel, a man, who, at the time the article had been written, was yet to be identified.

_"That was me,"_ he whispered, and he read on, then got to the part that mentioned his terrible injuries and how it was not known if he would survive, and then he put the article back in the drawer with the others, no longer wanting to stir up the past so sharply:

_It had been days before he had been identified, and more than a month before he could manage to speak because of the injury he had sustained to his throat when the swirling water had slammed him against the side of the shaft... It was too much pain to remember...  
_

Acres looked back at the other article, looking again at the faces of the survivors who had made it out before him, and he thought again about what Nonnie had said, about how they both saw the events of that night differently, maybe the others all had their own take on what had happened, too. He wished the Reverend Scott had made it, because he had placed a lot of faith in that man as he had stood up there on the galley and watched as Scott made his plans for the others to climb up the Christmas tree. He was sure if Scott was here now, he would listen to what he said, and believe every word, too – but Scott had died on the ship.

Acres put the articles back in the drawer and then slid it back into place, locked it and put the key on top of the cabinet. Then he sat down in the silent room and wondered what he could possibly do to stop the nightmares and the dark thoughts of the past haunting him. And he knew he had to find a way to do it _very_ soon – because tomorrow was New Year's Eve, and he knew he had reached the limit of what he could take when this time of year came around, and he did _not_ want to spend the next 12 months fearing the same happening all over again.

_He wanted it to change, he wanted to make peace with the past – but he did not know how to begin to do that..._


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

That night Acres slept badly, waking at every sound and then going back to sleep only to be woken again as the wind howled and in his mind it dashed across stormy waters as the waves whipped up and a tidal wave grew higher.

Then more dreams began to creep into the broken pieces of sleep he suffered, first a dream where he was back in the shaft and clinging to the ladder, knowing he was about to fall and waiting for the explosions to start.

The next one was the worst, where he dreamed he was struggling towards the opening that led to the shaft, he was about to reach for the ladder and looking down at the dizzying drop where water swirled far below, and then someone tugged on the sleeve of his waiter's jacket.

He turned his head in the dim tunnel, wondering why he was being distracted when he was cut and bleeding and just wanted to try and make it to that ladder – and there she was, his daughter was behind him.

"_I don't think we're going to make it, Daddy," she had said to him._

And Acres had sat up sharply, gasping for breath as his heart raced, and it was only the light of morning that brought him to his senses and reminded him that ten years had passed by since the sinking, and then as Nonnie put her arms around him he had clung to her as she spoke softly to him, and then Acres had closed his eyes and stayed in her embrace, remembering he was at home, he was far from the sea and he was safe, and so was Nonnie and Charlotte.

But no matter how many times he reminded himself that the sinking had been a decade before, it hung over him all day, like a looming shadow ready to breathe down his neck or tap him on the shoulder and that shadow, in his mind was as towering as the ship, and every bit as real and solid...

* * *

When evening came, more light snow was falling and Nonnie had to call to Charlotte three times before she finally came back into the warmth of the kitchen after building a snowman in the middle of the lawn.

"Can't I have ten more minutes?" she complained as she stood there in her thick winter coat and looked up at her mother.

"No!" she told her firmly, "It's dark out there! You've been out in that snow three times today!"

And Charlotte gave a sigh and took off her gloves and put them on the hot radiator and then she took off her hat and put that on the radiator too, and finally she hung up her scarf.

"Its not fair!" she said as she started to sulk, and then she hung up her coat and Nonnie handed her a mug of hot chocolate.

"Go in the front room and sit by the fire, you need to warm up!" she told her.

* * *

Later on that evening, as Nonnie sat down beside her husband and watched as he quickly switched channels to avoid another mention of the anniversary of the sinking, she wished she had not encouraged her daughter to go upstairs and play with her new dolls house instead – because it was difficult to talk about an awkward subject like bad memories and nightmares in front of her...

"Acres."

"Hmm?"

"You're not actually watching anything. You're just staring off into space."

He looked into her eyes and although he was trying to hide it, she caught sight of it immediately – that haunted look was still there, as if the memory of that night ten years before was playing over again in his memory.

"I'm just trying to avoid it."

"The memories?"

"New Year's Eve."

She got up and turned off the TV and then sat down beside him again.

"There you go, forget the date."

He gave a sigh.

"I wish I could."

Their eyes met again and as she shifted closer he wanted to take her in his arms and kiss her deeply, he wanted them to be on the floor in front of the fire on the soft carpet as he took her gently and whispered that he loved her, he wanted to be warm and in her embrace and knowing nothing but losing himself in the bliss of togetherness and orgasm and to think about how good it felt to be alive, instead of feeling as if a cold reminder of death hung over them.

But he couldn't do that, because Charlotte was still up and it wasn't quite her bed time yet.

"I looked at your collection," he said to Nonnie quietly, and glanced to the locked drawer.

Her eyes widened in surprise.

"What did you do that for?"

He shrugged.

"Desperation maybe, I don't know."

Charlotte glanced at her parents.

"What are you talking about?"

"Nothing!" Acres exclaimed.

"Then why were you whispering?"

"I wasn't!"

Nonnie laughed, and as the hand on the clock shifted to nine thirty she spoke up.

"Bedtime for you," she reminded her.

Charlotte put down a detailed colouring book and left pens all over the floor by the fire and got up.

"Can't I stay up and see New Year?"

Acres felt slightly guilty, but said nothing as his wife answered for him.

"We don't celebrate New Year, honey – Daddy doesn't like it, and I'm not too fond of it either. Now go off to bed."

* * *

After their daughter had said goodnight and gone upstairs, Nonnie made some tea and then went back into the front room and as she sat down again, she watched as Acres sat there, his head turned from the darkened TV screen as he watched the snow falling beyond the window.

"Nothing to think about now but the snow," she remarked.

Acres gave a sigh and turned back to his wife.

"The snow, the winter, Christmas – then spring and summer, watching the seasons turn – we get to do all of that every single year, we get all this extra time that so many others didn't get a chance to see."

"I thought you didn't think like that."

"Like what?" he asked her.

"Like you look back and wonder why you made it and they didn't."

"I don't think that way at all," he replied, "I was just thinking about life. I've spent ten years wrapped up in the Poseidon, inside a turned over ship that went to the bottom of the ocean long ago – I don't belong there, Nonnie – I don't belong with the dead in the chilly water and the darkness, I'm warm and alive and breathing and..." he paused, considered the thought that had just came to mind and then as he spoke again, his own idea had genuinely surprised him as he realised what it all meant :

"And I have a life worth living, worth holding on to and I deserve _not_ to look back because I left _no_ part of me in that sinking ship!"

Nonnie looked into his eyes, wishing she could find the answer he sought – but all she saw was darkness reflected, a haunted look that would not leave him until New Year was over.

"Maybe it's just the idea of ghosts," she said quietly "I don't mean real ones, I'm pretty sure the people who died are at peace now, they were ordinary people like you and me, they just wanted to be happy...I can't see how haunting the living could make them feel happy at all. So maybe its just your idea of seeing them as ghosts, ghosts mixed up in water... it makes sense to me."

"Maybe, I don't know," Acres replied.

And then Nonnie's sombre expression lightened up.

"Any way, I have something for you tonight – just a little something to take your mind off New Year."

His reply surprised her.

"Maybe that's what I'm doing wrong," he said, "I avoid it every year, and every year is the same. No, I'm going to do something else tonight – I want to take a look at your press cuttings about the sinking."

"Why?" Nonnie asked him, "You said you already looked at them once."

"But we didn't look at them together," he replied, hoping that perhaps if they went over the memories together,_ perhaps_ it would affect him differently...

And that was how they spent the next few hours, sitting together on the sofa, with the press cuttings on the coffee table in front of them, while the TV was switched back on and kept down at a low volume so as not to wake Charlotte, simply because Nonnie liked the idea of Big Ben in central London chiming in the new year.

As Acres looked through each article, again he felt the chill of the sea and the pain of his own bones cracking as he remembered the ship turning over, he thought of the dead and the wrecked ship and how he had fallen from the ladder and far down into the water. At each step of the way through reading the articles, Nonnie spoke up and gave her take on what had been written and about what she remembered.

But she had travelled on with the others and found a way out, and he was sure she felt so much better about it all simply because for her, on that night, there had been strength in numbers.

_Was any of this useful?_

_Was it really helping him?_

_Acres doubted it..._

* * *

It was almost midnight when Nonnie had opened up the final piece on the sinking, it was a large, double page and was dominated by a huge picture of the stricken vessel turned over in the water.

And then she heard it announced on the TV that it was almost midnight, and Nonnie looked up and smiled to see the crowds getting ready for the chimes in Trafalgar Square.

"Acres, leave that for now."

He looked up from the article.

"You know I don't celebrate this, not any more -"

"But you can try, maybe just this once?"

He gave a sigh.

"No, I don't want to."

"Okay then, shut your eyes."

He looked at her in surprise.

"You've got me a present on tonight, of all nights?"

She laughed softly.

"Just do it."

"What is it?"

"I'm not saying, I've got it in my hand -"

And she smiled and that smile of hers was playful and for a moment Acres forgot all about the memories and the time of year, and made a grab for her closed hand.

"Give it to me!"

She giggled.

"No – let go – _let go!_"

And then as he playfully pulled it from her grip, it fell on to the table, landing across the opened up article about the sinking, it had fallen right across the image of the upturned ship...

And as Big Ben chimed in the New Year on low volume on the TV, Acres looked down at what had fallen there, seeing it over the image of the SS Poseidon, and then as he blinked away tears as he looked into Nonnie's eyes, all trace of his sadness was gone.

"You know what that is?" she asked him.

He laughed softly.

"Of course I do, you use one before with Charlotte. It's a pregnancy test."

"A_ positive_ pregnancy test," Nonnie added.

And Acres looked down at the test, lying on top of the article about the Poseidon, and then as he looked back to Nonnie, the weight he had carried in his heart since the sinking lifted, and he started to smile.

_"__We got together because of that ship, you're right,"_ he said to her, _"And that ship is the reason for our family. The Poseidon didn't give us death, in the end, she gave us life."_

"I know," Nonnie said as tears filled her eyes, "I'm so glad you get that part too now."

And Acres stood up and so did his wife and as he took her in his arms and kissed her, on the TV Big Ben was ringing out the last of the chimes to welcome in the New Year.

And as he held her and kissed her, the thought occurred to Acres that from now on, he would always feel a little differently about New Year's Eve, and in a good way – because it was time to stop looking back, and now only look forward, because it was _definitely _time to start thinking about life once more, because life was going to be good, and they had much to look forward to:

_They had always had a lot to be happy about, but he had just not been able to see that - but he did now - he really, truly did..._

The End


End file.
